At least 25 Botswana citizens residing in the Chinese city of Wuhan that is at the centre of the novel Coronavirus (Covid-19) have pleaded with the Gaborone authorities to evacuate them to the southern African country as they fear for their safety, APA learnt here Wednesday.
In a letter to the Botswana government, the citizens said that “the actions and inactions (monitoring of the situation) by our government, coupled with the worsening conditions here, have left us stranded and thus we feel abandoned.”
“The urgency of this request is summarized by the goodwill gestures of the Government of Algeria who evacuated its citizens and those of Tunisia, Libya and Mauritania as a friendly act as well as New Zealand which airlifted citizens from Papua New Guinea on humanitarian grounds,” the letter said.
More than 73,000 people had been confirmed with COVID-19 infection as of February 18, with nearly 2,000 deaths in China and around the world.
KO/jn/APA